It's 5 a.m. on a sultry summer morning when I am awakened
from a sound sleep by a wailing voice. I sit up, peek
through the curtains at the head of my bed. Though threads
of sunlight are dappling the alleyway, no one is in sight.
The wailing continues. Someone must be injured or otherwise
in distress, I think. I have never heard this sound before
while sleeping in Nichols House. Then I remember, I'm not
on campus — I'm not even in Baltimore. I am in a
strange bed in Beijing, China, jet-lagged from having
arrived yesterday evening on a transcontinental flight. I
also think I might be dreaming.

I arise, look out another set of windows — nothing.
So, back to bed I go, reaching REM sleep within minutes.
About an hour later, I am again awakened. This time the
wailing voice is clearly a woman's, and the sound has a
repetitive, rhythmic quality. I quickly put on some clothes
and go out into the courtyard of our apartment complex. I
see an elderly woman driving a large tricycle piled about
four feet high with flattened boxes. As the woman
agonizingly peddles down the alley, she wails.

I get it — she is collecting cardboard for recycling.
Over the next two weeks of our stay, my wife, Wendy, and I
will learn to distinguish the fruit and vegetable vendors,
the plastic bottle and cardboard box recyclers, and the
beggars — all from the sound of their wailing.

Beginnings

Early in 2006 my assistant, Mary Ann Driscoll, was putting
together my calendar for the coming year. I inquired about
the status of the 20th anniversary celebration for the
Hopkins-Nanjing Center (HNC). Because of the pressure
of getting a new building completed on that campus, it was
decided to move the celebration from the summer of 2006 to
June 2007, technically, of course, now the 21st anniversary
of the program's founding. Knowing that I had a one-year
reprieve in which to prepare a short speech to be given at
the ceremony, I thought to myself, Why not give my speech
in Mandarin Chinese?

Why not indeed? Had I studied Chinese previously, this
might not have been such a far-fetched idea. But having no
more than a six-word vocabulary in Mandarin, I should have
heeded the advice of one of our Johns Hopkins trustees, Wen
Shi. When I mentioned this idea, he said simply, "Good
luck!" and gave me a look that suggested the utter
preposterousness of the attempt. So now, of course, I had
to go through with it.

The next step was to engage the full force and intellect of
Johns Hopkins in my quest. I contacted a number of people
associated with the Hopkins-Nanjing Center and asked where
I should study. The consensus view was that I should go to
Beijing for as long as practicable and study at the Taipei
Language Institute. (Sure, it sounds a bit strange that the
No. 1 Beijing language school should be a Taiwan-based
company, but welcome to China. Actually, TLI has a long and
distinguished history teaching Mandarin to Westerners of
all ages.)

Once Wendy was on board — a much easier argument than
I had expected — we were off and running, carving out
a two-week educational vacation in early July.

Hutong

But where to stay? On the advice of Daniel Wright, the
former director of the Hopkins-Nanjing Center program for
Johns Hopkins, and Alex Brenner, a 2002 HNC graduate then
living and studying in Beijing, we decided to stay in an
apartment in one of Beijing's old-style neighborhoods
called hutongs. We remembered these intriguing
environs from our very first visit to China, in 1994.
Hutong means "lane" or "alley," and the hutong areas
of Beijing are a maze of small alleys, dotted by walled
courtyard residences that at one time, prior to 1949, were
home to the feudal lord and his wives, concubines,
children, and servants. After the Communist revolution,
many families were moved into these residences.

Most of the hutong residences are one-story, with no
indoor plumbing, and most have a lot of deferred
maintenance from years of neglect. Some, though, have been
upgraded, and I understand a few senior Communist Party
officials and well-connected friends have modernized theirs
into stately residences. These were hidden from view,
though we would occasionally see a government Audi A6 with
blacked-out windows zipping through the hutong,
with the chauffeur taking an official to his or her
home.

Park Life

Our first morning, we rose with the sun, dressed quickly
— jeans, polo shirt, and tennis shoes would become
our uniform of choice — and walked down the Ju'er
Hutong (our street) to a well-known public park called
Beihai. By night, Beihai is a center of discos and bars for
the younger set, especially for expats, but in the early
morning, it is still the province of the local citizens,
who use the area for tai chi, fishing, jogging, hiking,
ping-pong, stretching, singing Chinese or Western operatic
songs, or playing the two-string Chinese violin (called an
R-hu). Some activities surprised us: The Chinese
have a passion for ballroom dancing, entirely a Western
import, and in the park, groups of 15 or 20 people dance
alone or together under the direction of a teacher.

Beihai has a large lake, where people fish using very long
bamboo poles, despite the prominently displayed "No
Fishing" signs. The lakes in China are generally very
polluted, and while beautiful from a distance, up close
they are filled with so much trash sometimes it looks like
you could walk on them. I certainly would not be eager to
eat the fish from these polluted ponds!

Vendors

Everywhere in Beijing, there are street vendors selling
everything imaginable. Close to Beihai was a small
pedestrians-only street where food vendors set up shop in
the morning and evening. That first morning, I decided to
do what the locals do, so I stopped by a street vendor to
purchase China's equivalent of the Egg McMuffin — an
egg over glutinous rice — for which I paid 5 Mao (1/2
a yuan, or about 6 cents). I probably overpaid relative to
what the locals were paying, but with no knowledge of
Mandarin, I was not in a strong bargaining position.

During the days we were at school, we would buy fruit from
the migrant family next door to take along for our lunch.
They were lovely people who had moved to Beijing in search
of work, and they operated a small fruit market that
usually had very fresh produce. I thought at first the
couple had two children, both girls. People from rural
areas, I understand, are allowed to have two children,
whereas everyone else is limited to one child. The fruit
seller's younger daughter was named Duo-duo, which loosely
translated means "too much." Her name perplexed me, until I
discovered one day that the couple actually had a son as
well, but because of the child restriction policy, their
three children were never seen in the store together. Duo-
duo was perhaps the result of an unplanned pregnancy.

Bicycles

The number of bicycles in China is mind-boggling, though
every year in Beijing the increasing affluence means more
and more cars. I am told that the only thing growing faster
than the number of cars is the number of cell phones; there
are now estimated to be more than 400 million cell phones
in China, and in the big cities like Beijing and Shanghai,
the networks seem to work flawlessly.

Bicycle theft is a big problem, so having an older rental
bike proves to be an asset — except when it comes to
efficient pedaling and braking. Our bikes look to be at
least 40 years old. Wendy's is in poorer condition than
mine, and she often has to use her feet to slow down.
Fortunately after a week of this, our shi fu or
"bicycle master," Mr. Yang, is able to come up with a
"newer" replacement, still decades old, but with brakes
that actually stop the bike.

We have problems with our bikes almost every day. The daily
80-minute commute through Beijing roads and traffic wears
on the bikes, and the nearly nightly rain usually causes
some part, like the brakes, to freeze up from rust. Mr.
Yang is incredible. He can quickly diagnose any mechanical
problem and just as quickly find a solution. He is very
concerned with our welfare, so he gives us priority
service, even adding a bell to ward off offending
pedestrian or bicycle traffic.

Small World

On most days, Wendy and I spend about five hours in class.
We each get individual instruction, with different teachers
for one-hour segments. Most of the teachers are young women
— very few of them seem to be older than 32 or so
— who are diligent and take pride in their
profession. We have a 10-minute break each hour, during
which we mingle with the other students. They range from
college students studying Mandarin for the summer, to
professionals transferred to Beijing by companies,
embassies, or NGOs. One day Wendy and I talk with a lovely
young Korean woman who is studying at TLI. After exchanging
pleasantries, I find out she is a student at the Johns
Hopkins Nitze School of Advanced International Studies,
learning Chinese here between her first and second year as
part of the China Studies Program. She looks questioningly
at me in my jeans and polo shirt, not believing at first
that I might actually be the president of Johns Hopkins!
Another morning, while biking to school, I pass a bicyclist
going in the opposite direction wearing a Hopkins-Nanjing
Center T-shirt. The crowd of bicycles precludes my turning
around to follow him. Perhaps he bought the shirt
second-hand, I think to myself as a way of assuaging my
guilt for not chasing him down.

Eating

Our guidebook says there are 40,000 restaurants in Beijing,
and I suspect that number is low. Most of the time we go to
one nearby, either on our street or a block or two away.
One of our favorites is a Muslim restaurant, where we get
dinner for two for $2 or $3, including a chicken kabob,
curried eggplant, rice, and beer. The food is quite tasty,
though perhaps not as hygienic as at home — I really
liked the barbequed chicken or lamb on a bamboo skewer
until Wendy observed that they probably reuse the skewers.
TsingTao beer is, of course, popular here, but I much
preferred the local beers, which have a more distinctive
taste and are especially refreshing after a day's bicycle
commute. Chinese wine is appearing on the scene, along with
imported wine from Australia and Europe. MaoTai, the
traditional 120-proof whiskey that is readily ignited,
seems to be in diminishing use, with wine substituting at
many banquets where Westerners are guests.

Aside from the hutong vendors, there are many
restaurants serving a wide variety of Chinese regional
cuisines, with hotpot being a Beijing standard. When you
sit down in a restaurant, the waiter or waitress will come
to your table and expect you immediately to order your
food. With many of the menus nearly as large as the
Baltimore phone book, it would take us a long time to
peruse the listings, something that did not make us popular
with the wait staff. I never figured out how customers were
able to order right away, but most of them did. Food was
generally cheap and well-prepared, with some bearing a
modest resemblance to the Chinese food we eat in the United
States.

Restaurants also smell different from what we are
accustomed to in the United States. One distinctive odor is
that of a food loosely called "stinky tofu" — an
acquired taste, I am told, and one I never had the courage
to try.

Shopping

On a visit to the Antique Market (Pan Jia Yuan), we
encounter the largest flea market I have ever seen, with
several acres of stalls selling everything from jewelry and
clothes to large pieces of heavy Chinese furniture. Wendy
immediately goes exploring, while I spend my time observing
the people and taking photographs to document the
experience. The next thing I know, Wendy is beckoning
— she has her eye on a large, ornate vase like those
you might see in a museum or the lobby of the Mandarin
Oriental Hotel in Washington, D.C. She asks the seller,
"Dou shou qian?" ("How much does it cost?"), one of
the first phrases she learned at TLI. The seller says 3,500
Chinese yuan, about $400. Wendy offers 300 yuan, maybe $35.
I am appalled, but indicate no emotion. After some
gesticulating and little movement on the price, Wendy walks
out of that stall and eyes another seller's vases with
apparent interest. After a few minutes, the first vendor
walks over and offers a lower price, to which Wendy
gestures "no." The negotiations last about 20 minutes,
until buyer and seller agree on a price: about $40.

By the end of the second week, we think we are making
enough progress with our Mandarin that we spend more time
shopping in the stores frequented only by the Chinese.
There is a clothing store just a block or two from our
hutong, where Wendy inquires about a made-to-order
Chinese-style pantsuit. The silk material is beautiful and
inexpensive, especially compared to off-the-shelf clothing.
After much discussion with the proprietor, Wendy settles on
a design. (Down the street from our hutong is a very
small tailor shop, where a woman sews from about 7 in the
morning until 11 at night, and I assume that she is one of
several tailors whom the shop might employ to make Wendy's
suit.) When Wendy returns to the shop three days later, the
jacket is perfect, but the pants are made out of a silk too
heavy to wear in Baltimore most of the year. So we engage
in another complex dialogue to order a second pair, of
lighter silk. A day later, they are completed — and
perfect! Even with the second pair, the outfit is very
inexpensive by Western standards.

East and West

One of the first words you learn at Chinese language school
is dong-xi, which means "thing." Is there something
you want to eat, or buy? Dong-xi is a convenient
word to use, especially when you don't know many others.
What I discovered after beginning to study Chinese
characters is that the characters for dong-xi, as in
"thing," are exactly the same characters as for dong
or east and xi or west. How this came about I do not
know. But it struck me as a Westerner in Beijing that this
is exactly where the clash of dong and xi is
occurring, right before our eyes.

When we first visited Beijing in 1994, there were no
private cars, only government limousines; no recognizable
stores other than the government-operated "Friendship
Stores," where Western visitors were forced to shop,
attended by surly and unresponsive sales people. Today,
large modern shopping centers carry the latest goods from
Europe, the United States, and Japan. The stores are packed
with local residents buying everything off the shelves.
Beijing's largest bookstore, Xidan, is located on
Xichang'an Jie. It looks like a Barnes & Noble on steroids.
Every aisle is jammed with people, standing, sitting, or
squatting down reading books from off the shelves.

Automobiles and high-rise condominiums are pushing people
out of their comfortable homes. McDonald's, Kentucky Fried
Chicken, WalMart, Ikea, rock music, and — oh, yes
— Starbucks are transforming the country's daily life
and economic fortunes. Large networks of family and friends
are being torn apart as children move to remote locations
in search of good-paying jobs, much as occurred in the U.S.
and Europe. The Chinese adore many things Western. Yet, at
the same time, the thirst for xi is rapidly destroying many
of the roots of Chinese culture.

After nearly two weeks, we have become fairly acclimated to
life in Beijing. The horrendous heat and humidity are
tolerable to Baltimoreans, but the world-class pollution
beats us. Some days we literally cannot see the buildings
across the street. But we are compensated by the sights,
smells, sounds, great variety of food, and daily excursions
filled with excitement and exposure to a completely
different culture. Our vacation may not be one that many
readers would choose, but it gave us a wonderful
appreciation of the issues facing the Chinese people as
they grapple with the collision between east and west, old
and new.

While our Chinese communication skills are still very
limited, we enjoy being around the local Beijing people
(Beijing-ren), who are incredibly helpful,
especially considering that Beijing is such a huge
metropolis. The Chinese we encounter have a wonderful sense
of humor and — as in Italy, where Wendy and I lived
for a time early in our married life — they have a
love of family, food, and friends. A network
(guan-xi) of friends and colleagues is particularly
important in this country, where it is easy to otherwise
become another face in a sea of faces.

We sadly say goodbye to Beijing, wishing our stay were
much, much longer. We are eagerly awaiting our return to
China and to Nanjing. As for the speech in Chinese at the
Nanjing celebration, wish me luck — I'll need it!